solution: -bash: ulimit: open files: cannot modify limit: Operation not permitted

It is interesting when I login to oracle in Linux and see this message on screen: “-bash: ulimit: open files: cannot modify limit: Operation not permitted“. It hit the maximum open files value in Unix/Linux user shell resource limitation. Then we run ulimit command to get the current maximum value and to increase it in the file /etc/security/limits.conf.

Example:

[oracle@dev01 ~]$ ulimit -Hn
65536
[oracle@dev01 ~]$ grep nofile /etc/security/limits.conf |grep hard
oracle hard nofile 65536
# Let me purposely give a higher value !
[oracle@dev01 ~]$ ulimit -Hn 65537
-bash: ulimit: open files: cannot modify limit: Operation not permitted

Reason:

ulimit [-SHacdefilmnpqrstuvx [limit]]

Provides control over the resources available to the shell and to processes  started by it, on systems that allow such control.  The -H and -S options specify that the hard or  soft  limit  is  set  for  the  given resource.   A hard limit cannot be increased once it is set; a soft limit may be increased up to the value of the hard limit.  If neither -H nor -S is specified, both the soft and hard limits are set.

 

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